Zinc oxide is a promising semiconductive material due to its large bandgap and binding energy. In addition zinc is an abundant and relatively expensive alternative to silicon. However, there are significant challenges to making zinc oxide thin films. For example, the techniques used for silicon thin film manufacturing generally cannot be applied to the manufacture of metal oxide films. Although many metal oxide films, including zinc oxide films, can be grown on a solid substrate, there are no known chemical etchants that are able to selectively remove the underlying substrate and allow for the lift-off of the metal oxide film. In addition, although films of polycrystalline metal oxides, such as zinc oxide, can be formed using processes such as sputter deposition and chemical vapor deposition, these polycrystalline films do not have the desirable semiconducting properties that certain single-crystalline metal oxide films can provide.